


Scars

by UnabashedlyLoudNacho



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Dark, Gen, I'm Bad At Tagging, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 20:25:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9288278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnabashedlyLoudNacho/pseuds/UnabashedlyLoudNacho
Summary: Percival Graves is in recovery after having been kidnapped by Grindelwald. But he is afraid of things that he has never been afraid of before and doesn't quite know how to cope.I suck at summaries!





	

**Author's Note:**

> This fic might be triggering to some people so do keep the tags in mind.
> 
> I am not a native English speaker so I do apologize for any grammar mistakes I might have made. I'm also aware that I tend to blend American-English and British-English together - I just don't notice it myself. And this isn't beta-ed.
> 
> Oh, and I haven't written anything other than school-stuff for years, and it's been at least a decade since I wrote a fanfic! I just can't get this movie out of my head and wanted to add to the fandom in my own small way. Hopefully this fic isn't too awful!

Everything was so dark. He couldn’t see anything. But he was aware of a movement close by. He used to be a brave man who could stand up against anything, no matter how frightening. Not anymore – that aspect of his personality had been crucioed out of him. Now Percival Graves lay on the rough stone floor in a foetal position, shaking with fear.

“Look at you,” taunted a cold voice in the darkness. His voice. “The proud Auror, the Director of Magical Security, cowering like a kicked puppy.” There was a cackling laughter and a shuffle of feet coming closer. Percival tried to move away only to find that he was backed up against a wall.

“Please,” Percival croaked out. “No more, just let me die.”

“Hmmmm,” the man in the darkness bent down until he was face to face with Percival. Even in the darkness Percival could see his own face staring back at him with an uncharacteristic grin. “I have gotten all that I want from you,” the grinning face said thoughtfully. “But I just enjoy your company oh so much!” A loud laughter filled the cold room when Percival’s doppelgänger stepped on his hand and broke the bones in it.

****

Percival gasped and shot up in bed. He looked around frantically, trying to sort out his surroundings. A dim light was on in the room that Percival registered as his bedroom. After having been kidnapped and kept in a cold, dark room by the darkest wizard the world had seen (at least in recent times) for months he couldn’t sleep without lights on – if he slept at all. 

Percival brought his shaking hands to his face to wipe the cold sweat out of his eyes. No matter what he tried to do his hands just wouldn’t stop trembling. He could still feel the pain in the hand that Grindelwald, his kidnapper, had stomped on. The medi-wizards had done everything they could to save the use of his hand, but despite all the medical wizardry his fingers were crooked and bent. Holding anything for long periods of time – for example a quill when writing or a wand – was painful. 

Percival got up from his bed, grabbing his wand that he kept underneath his pillow at night, and walked towards the bathroom. There was also a light in there, for he had found himself incapable of walking into dark rooms, even armed with a lumosed wand. He shuffled toward the toilette but made the mistake of glancing toward the mirror.

He froze.

There he was. 

The man who had kept him locked up for months.

The man who, when he had gotten all the information he needed out of Percival, had still kept on torturing him – for fun.

Percival roared and lunched himself at the mirror, forgetting all about magic and his wand he punched the glass again and again, shards flying everywhere and sticking into his hands. He didn’t feel any pain, he just wished he could throttle the man in the mirror. 

Percival shrunk to the floor panting and growling low in his throat. He grabbed the biggest shard he saw of off the floor and looked into it. A logical voice in the back of his head told him that the face looking back was not the face of his torturer, but his own face, gaunt and exhausted. And then a thought struck him.

Grindelwald had taken everything from him – his job, his health, his sanity – all the while wearing Percival’s face. Everything scared him now, commonplace things that he had never thought of as remotely frightening before – the dark, crowds, loud noises, being alone, his face. He still had a long way to go to get over his fear of most of those things. But what if he could change just one thing. That would help, right?

He turned the glass shard in his hand, not caring that it was cutting into his already bloodied fingers and palm, until the pointy end was directed towards his face. Then he brought it down.

He cut into his left cheek and blood oozed everywhere. He cut again and again.

The he did the same to his right cheek.

Then to his nose, and his forehead, and his chin, and his lips, and everywhere else that he could reach without hurting his eyes. Those he did not want to hurt, he had had enough of darkness.

When he was satisfied he dropped the shard onto the floor with the others. The room looked like a grotesque murder-scene. Which it might as well be, because it was there that the old Percival Graves died completely. 

Percival casually stopped the bleeding of his wounds with his wand, careful not to heal anything because he wanted the wounds to scar. Then he lay down on the tiled floor and smiled to himself as he drifted off to sleep.

Now he would not have to be afraid of his own face, now it looked nothing like the face that Grindelwald stole.

**Author's Note:**

> So that's it. I might write a sequel or two, I have some ideas, but those would most likely involve Newt and some Gramander. 
> 
> Any feedback would be greatly appreciated :)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Friendly Fire](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14357595) by [lilolilyrae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilolilyrae/pseuds/lilolilyrae)




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